MISSOURI COMMENTARY: AFTER WEEKS OF THE LATEST SAGA: TAKING PROSPERITY OVER PROPRIETY

When the Monica Lewinsky matter first broke, my initial reaction was that we might well be in the fourth quarter of the Clinton presidency. I verified my political acumen with a call to the "Sage of Missouri Sages." "He's history," he said flat out and hung up.

Now we are three weeks plus into the saga. It's till in the first quarter, but Clinton is on top with the American people (66 percent to 68 percent approval rating). Ken Starr is at the bottom (28 percent approval rating -- equal to Speaker Newt Gingrich).

Some observations:

-- President Clinton. The President will not lose his office solely because he engaged in extra-curricular infidelities. Grover Cleveland, Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson are a partial history lesson on the inescapable fallibility of even the most powerful men on earth. Amongst those who only aspired to the White House, we have Wendell Willkie, Nelson Rockefeller, Bob Dole, Gary Hart and a vast cast of walk-on players to add to the list.

Calvin Coolidge is considered the most chaste of our presidents. Even when he went fishing, he wore a dark suit with vest and a discreet felt hat. Coolidge was the epitome of propriety born of blissful ignorance.

For now, it seems that the American public -- always more oriented to temporal, monetary benchmarks -- prefers a genius president perhaps flirtatious with the truth to a dolt of a president self-righteously singing his own virtue.

-- The Nixon "parallel." Richard Nixon was almost as smart as Bill Clinton, but Nixon was Nixon and Clinton is Clinton. Nixon was tricky, Clinton is slick. Nixon couldn't sell you a used car; Clinton could talk you into buying two.

Denounce him, hate him, scorn him -- summons any emotion you wish. Bill Clinton is still the most clever, nimble and adroit politician to occupy the White House since Franklin Roosevelt. His powers of persuasion equal those of Ronald Reagan. His quickness on his feet is praised even by his enemies. As one die-hard Republican put it, "that boy sure can talk."

In boxing, there are various ways to evaluate the combatants. Counter-punching is one of the most admired skills. Middle-weight Tony Zale was the best I ever saw. he could absorb an onslaught from Rocky Graziano and then dish it back stronger than he had taken.

Clinton is the Tony Zale of presidential politics. He has taken a multitude of "8 counts" and "9 counts." He has been knocked off balance. He has sometimes done the Rope-a-Dope on one foot. He counter-punches. He has the stamina to go 15 rounds. He survives.

-- The economy. James Carville famously observed in 1992 that "It's the economy, stupid." That was what he saw as the winning message for Clinton then. It was also Clinton's winning message in 1996. It's still his message.

In his State of the Union address, Clinton properly boasted about the economy and spelled out how he would save Social Security, Medicare, and most anything else worth saving. The Lewinsky matter doubled his viewing audience and the people liked what he said and how he said it. Up go the polls.

Do Americans favor prosperity over propriety? Free enterprise and capitalism are the highways to comfort and advancement; prayer is the highway to heaven. The Wall Street Journal declares, "Clinton's support remains strong because voters view him as a successful CEO, not a moral example."

The director of polling for CBS announced that "increasing numbers of Americans believe that the Lewinski/Clinton item is a private matter" and that "the country should move on to its public business."

ABC reports that "72 percent of the people consider the economy to be good or excellent" -- the highest such rating since ABC began polling this item in 1985.

The stock markets zooms ever upward. American prosperity is seemingly perpetual.

Economic euphoria is how you reconcile the president's 66 percent favorable rating with the same polls indicating that 66 percent of the people do not believe the president is telling the truth about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky.

Clinton's political power is the power of the wallet and the Dow Jones average.

-- The independent counsel. The position used to be called "special prosecutor." That was, in fact, the appropriate term then and should still be the common usage. Anyone taking such a position assumes that his objective is to convict a celebrity official, not to issue a clean bill of health. Archibald Cox and Leon Jaworski will be remembered long after Lawrence Walsh. The old G-Man phrase was "The FBI gets is man." An independent counsel is dedicated to get his man (and woman too).

As to "incuding" witnesses to testify as to what the prosecutor wants, prosecutors assume they and they alone know the full truth. Therefore, they conclude there is nothing wrong with encouraging witnesses to fit their testimony to the prosecutor's revealed truth. Forcing a witness to testify under immunity is akin to a tailor-made suit. The witness fits his or her testimony to the prosecutor's measurements.

If Ken Starr forces Clinton out of office or puts Hillary Clinton in jail, he's public hero #1. If he fails in both of these, it's off to Pepperdine and obscurity -- no Supreme Court appointment.

Does Ken Starr Leak? You bet. Did Rudy Giuliani leak when he was United States Attorney in New York? No question. Did Tom Dewey leak when he was hunting down Lepke Buchalter and "Murder Inc."? Certainly, he did. Even little old Prosecuting Attorneys in Midwestern cities leak.

"Handling the press" is a key facet of any prosecutorial office. New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau has always been better at leaking than he is at law. Officials responsible for "the public interest" bask in headlines. How can you convince people you are protecting the "public interest" unless you brag about it in public?

Is it noble? No. does it do honor to the prosecutorial process? No. Does it help win cases? Prosecutors -- and special prosecutors -- think so. The impulse to leak is irresistible.

Clinton is on firm political ground to use the leaks as a tactic to muddy Ken Starr. Starr is right to pretend that, of course, he doesn't know who is doing the leaking and hopes he will stumble around and find out. Starr must mouth this with the look of a self-righteous Jerry Falwell. Independent counsels tell the truth some of the time, but never all of the time.

As for Monica's attorney, William Ginsburg, he should summon forth his first moment of brilliance and surrender his license to practice law.

-- The pious press. Pity the press. The days of Pulitzer Prize rectitude are gone. Even a columnist like David Broder says that the practice of having an allegation verified by two independent sources is outmoded. "One source today is enough," he says. Lots of today's reporters proceed on no-source trial balloons. If you hear it at a cocktail party, print it.

Mainstream journalism is in mortal combat with the National Enquirer. The Enquirer's ethics become journalism's ethics.

The rush to publish, the rush to get on the air doesn't allow time for accuracy. CNN is on the air 24 hours of the day. The Internet is seconds away. Today's journalistic standard is: Publish it now, check it later.

Remember the swarms of reports who surrounded Clinton's secretary, Betty Currie, as she left the courthouse? Remember the hordes of television cameramen crashing in on Monica Lewinsky as she and her father tried to go out do dinner? In television "if it bleeds, it leads." Broadcast journalism is a blood sport -- the more blood, the more bashing, the better.

The worrisome thing is not this ugly behavior. What is more troubling is that most Americans who get their "information" from the television tube.

-- Is the president home free? Has the "Comeback Kid" done it once again?

The president has done surprisingly well in this first quarter. His poll numbers are remarkable. But bear in mind we are still in the first quarter.

~Tom Eagleton is a former U.S. senator from Missouri and an occasional columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.